On Oct. 28, 1949, Wilkerson erroneously named the 28-year-old actress as a communist sympathizer when he published a list of those who had signed an amicus curiae brief urging the Supreme Court to toss out the convictions of screenwriters Dalton Trumbo and John Howard Lawson. Distraught, Davis sought the counsel of director Mervyn LeRoy, who contacted his friend Reagan, then head of the Screen Actors Guild.

According to LeRoy's 1974 autobiography, Take One, the future 40th U.S. president soon dialed her up, asking if they might have dinner to discuss her concerns.